Why I Love Baltimore, And Why It Will Bounce Back

Baltimore has sometimes been viewed as the bastard albino step-child when compared to Washington, D.C, its more glamorous sister city just 40 miles down the road.

Not to me.

Baltimore has always been special.

I have two adopted cities that I love, and as a native New Yorker neither one should surprise you. One is Detroit, where I worked for four years, and one is Baltimore. Like New York, I find both to be gritty, real, outspoken and genuine.

To see the city of Detroit go through its problems was difficult, to be sure.

To watch what happened in Baltimore on Monday night was heartbreaking, to say the least.

They are picking up the pieces this morning, literally, after riots and looting devastated the city. Protests over the death of Freddie Gray – a Baltimore resident who died of a spinal cord injury while in police custody – turned violent. Businesses were burned and looted.

A CVS drugstore in one neighborhood, a literal lifeblood of the community, was burned. Twelve other buildings in the city were burned. More than 200 have been arrested, and 15 police officers have been injured. School has been postponed today. The Baltimore Orioles’ game last night – a Major League Baseball game, for goodness sake – was postponed last night.

It is frustrating, and sad, and I pray that when night falls this evening that nothing happens.

But this is not a political commentary.

This is a commentary about a great city that will bounce back.

I first visited Baltimore in 1992 as a young sportswriter on assignment, there for four days and three nights to cover basketball, but eager to see everything the city had to offer – including this much-ballyhooed new ballpark that was set to open in less than two months and would become the prototype new throw-back, compact stadium copied by countless franchises.

But oh, did I see so much more than the beginnings of Camden Yards.

The Inner Harbor was beautiful, and this was well before it was built up the way it is now. I saw where The Star Spangled Banner was written at Fort McHenry, visited Fell’s Point, went to the National Aquarium.

The history alone is amazing.

The food? Don’t even get me started on Maryland crabcakes and seafood.

It took my wife six years to catch on to why I liked to take a vacation to Ocean City and a day trip to Baltimore.

I have been to Baltimore more than a dozen times, and it is always a pleasure. Yet the funny thing is, my most lasting memory of Baltimore came on that very first night in town. I was young, single, no children and did what 20-somethings out on the town with two buddies do – generally be reckless.

We found what I still say was the world’s greatest sport bar, Baltimore’s Original Sports Bar, and indulged in food, drink and copious amounts of pop-a-shot basketball and skee-ball and arm-wrestling.

Next thing you know it was 4 a.m., I was freezing because I couldn’t find my coat, and we ended up in what I still say was the world’s greatest all-night cheesesteak place that included a cast of characters straight out of a sitcom – my friends and I, some neighborhood folks, a couple of ladies of the evening, and a half-dozen or so men and women who emerged from a limo dressed in tuxedos and evening gowns. All of us standing in line for a sandwich.

Baltimore is, and isn’t, what you’ve seen on television, starting with "The Wire" and continuing through Monday night’s unfortunate violence. In that way, it is no different than New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, Detroit.

Baltimore is also fascinating, mercurial, stunning, welcoming, no different than New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, Detroit.

Comments

You may use your Facebook account to add a comment, subject to Facebook's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your Facebook information, including your name, photo & any other personal data you make public on Facebook will appear with your comment, and may be used on TravelPulse.com. Click here to learn more.

Rich Thomaselli is a longtime journalist with 27 years experience in newspapers, magazines and digital media.
He is a nine-time individual award-winning writer and was also a staff writer at several publications that earned national recognition as well, including Advertising Age winning a ‘Best in Business’ designation from the Society of American Business Editors and Writers in 2007.
He previously covered the travel sector for Ad Age, among other beats, from 2001-2013.
Rich is married with two children. He will be based in New York. You can reach him at rthomaselli@travalliance.com and contact him on Twitter @RichTravelPulse.